Race, Socioeconomic Status, and Food Access in Two Predominantly White Cities: The Case of Lansing, East Lansing, and Surrounding Townships in Michigan

Dorceta E. Taylor (), Katherine Allison, Tevin Hamilton and Ashley Bell
Additional contact information
Dorceta E. Taylor: Yale School of the Environment, Yale University, 195 Prospect Street, New Haven, CT 06511, USA
Katherine Allison: Yale School of the Environment, Yale University, 301 Prospect Street, New Haven, CT 06511, USA
Tevin Hamilton: Pacific Environment, 473 Pine Street #3, San Francisco, CA 94104, USA
Ashley Bell: Yale School of the Environment, Yale University, 301 Prospect Street, New Haven, CT 06511, USA

Sustainability, 2023, vol. 15, issue 20, 1-49

Abstract: Access to fresh, healthy, affordable foods is a pressing concern in cities worldwide. American cities are no exception. Although many scholars study food access in large cities, small and mid-sized American cities can provide valuable information about inequities in the food system. This paper focuses on two adjoining, racially mixed Mid-Michigan cities—Lansing and East Lansing. It examines the extent to which different food outlets exist in the cities and surrounding townships. It probes the following questions: (1) How are food outlets distributed throughout the cities and suburbs? (2) What is the relationship between neighborhood demographic characteristics and the distribution of food outlet types? We collected data on food outlets from September 2020 to June 2022 using Data Axle as our primary source of information. We used ArcGIS 10.8.1 for the spatial mapping and SPSS 28 for statistical analyses. We conducted regression analyses to identify the difference in the likelihood of finding food retailers in census tracts where 0–20% of the residents were People of Color (VL-POC), 20.01–40% of the inhabitants were People of Color (L-POC), 40.1–60% of the residents were People of Color (H-POC), and more than 60% of residents were People of Color (VH-POC). There were 1647 food outlets in the study area: 579 were in Lansing, 220 were in East Lansing, and the remaining 848 were in the surrounding townships. Restaurants dominated the food landscape, while small groceries and convenience stores were the grocery sector’s most common food outlet types. Supermarkets and large grocery stores comprised only 5.6% of the study area’s food outlets. The study finds a nonlinear relationship between the racial composition of census tracts and the prevalence of food outlets. The VH-POC census tracts had very few food outlets. For instance, the tracts had no supermarkets, mass merchandisers or supercenters, small grocery or convenience stores, pharmacies or drug stores, or farmers’ markets. The findings illustrate the diversity and complexity of the Lansing–East Lansing metropolitan area’s food landscape.

Keywords: traditional supermarkets; grocery stores; mini marts; corner stores; restaurants; community gardens; food banks; food insecurity; census tracts; People of Color; income; education (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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